The F35 is a global product, with quite a few countries involved in manufacturing. I do think Europe and the UK could keep them flying without the US.

Hell, Iran kept their F14s going for many decades without US support.

I think the advantage there is they don’t need a full airfield to operate from, but if the UK has lost all it’s airfields, somebody’s getting nuked.

I’m aware. Do you think these guys want to be martyrs?

No, but they can certainly kill the Ayatollahs, and I don’t think they’re willing to die for the cause.

They quite famously killed the guy in charge, is what I’m getting at.

How many senior Taliban members are still alive from those days? The organisation persists, most of the leadership didn’t.

I really don’t think Iran’s leaders are that foolish, after what happened last time someone did that.

Who’s going to back up Iran though? Maybe the houthis, but they barely count.

They may try.

There would be more than just the US and Israel bombing them if that happened, you just don’t fuck with international trade.

You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make it drink.

As in, Muslim men behaving badly towards them?

By that line of reasoning, they could have all the components of a nuke, and not actually be manufacturing one until they bolt it together.

Imagine thinking this was remotely similar to Ukraine and Russia.

So if Iran starts building specific parts for nukes and processing the enriched Uranium in a way that is suitable for making a warhead, that would be building a nuke.

Which is precisely what they’re doing, unless you actually believe they want that level of enrichment for a power plant.

They have been enriching Uranium to the level needed for developing a nuclear weapon.

Isn’t that part of the process though?

I remember that, if I remember correctly, it was a tank, and they suddenly had a massive CoG shift to the back of the aircraft, causing the plane to pitch up and stall.

Every credible comment I’ve read says they’re in the process of developing them, the only group who says otherwise is Iran themselves.

Do you really want Iran to have nukes though?

Just because Israel are horrible, doesn’t automatically make the people they’re fighting the good guys.

I was just thinking about this, perhaps when the aircraft rotated, water or other contaminants got drawn into the fuel system?

Or shifting cargo damaged the fuel lines?

I think the simplest explanation, and the most likely one, is the pilots were too busy dealing with whatever shit was hitting the fan to raise the landing gear.

And, in my view, that’s a loss of engine power for whatever reason, possibly bad fuel.